Friday, 30 September 2011

The new exhibition is going up right now, it's a selection of artists who all attend a local drawing group. There is lots more information to follow, but as it is such a wonderfully sunny day I am taking the afternoon off to catch a few rays and will be posting all the details on Monday or Tuesday.

Sue was excited about using a new technique when she created this work, "Like a kid, I just wanted to explore and play". I always ask artists what is the story behind the work, why did they create it and Sue explained that just before her husband died, they had gone to Kildwick and her husband had taken some amazing pictures of the bluebell wood. The work took a couple of days to finish and was created in her kitchen, with lots of breaks and friends coming over to give their opinion.

Close up of the work, but this is a poor photograph of mine - and does not do justice to the work. Sorry Sue!

Sue was inspired since this work and has done a lot more textile and web fusion work. Which has since gone on display at Slattery's Patisserie in Manchester. Sue has also started to sell work already, which is impressive as she only finished the course in June!

Quirky Colne by Sue Rose

Sue talked to me for a few minutes about her inspirations; Beauty all around you, looking at things differently and that the industrial North can still be beautiful! I agree Sue and thanks so much for talking to us!

Wednesday, 28 September 2011

Here is another student, Lor, with his work. When I asked what inspires him to create art, Lor explained that creating and painting are simply a sheer pleasure for him, he really enjoys seeing something or creating something from nothing. He likes the impressionists and tends to like every type of art he sees, especially work where you can let your imagination go and study them in your own time.

Lor went on to say he had loved the course, My Art Journey, and had met some very interesting and pleasant people. This is good as we are running another My Art Journey course which starts in January.

Then we talked about his work above; Caterpillars from Space (which, quite frankly, is genius titling at work). I asked him to explain the reason for this choice of title and Lor said, "Its just that they look like that, it seems like they are on a mission and they do show a vaguely paranoid vision of what is happening now, which is, normal reality not breaking down but being questioned."

Lor said he was feeling quite light hearted when he created this piece, which he made during the class. Lor said it only took about 10 minutes to create this. The work was made with Brusho Powder Paints which are really bright and as Lor said "interacts nicely with damp and water".

Tuesday, 20 September 2011

May says "I was a complete novice, I learnt such a lot in those 12 weeks it's unbelievable". May also mentioned how she always looked forward to going to an Arts on Prescription session and how she met some lovely people too.

This is quite common for Arts on Prescription students, it's lovely to see them all at the end when they have made new groups of friends.

Here is one of May's artworks...

Bretherton Steps by May Peel

May created this from a photograph she had already taken and explained how she liked doing landscapes but after doing them, she has moved on to flowers. Each of these artworks took a few hours to complete.

And here is one...

Single Lily by May Peel

I always like to picture artists creating their work so I asked May to describe her workspace...

"In my dining room, I sit at the table and have a big piece of board on there to protect it. I am quite organised and have boxes of paints on one side and brushes and water on the other".

Wednesday, 14 September 2011

Here is part 2 of the current information... from a number of students from different courses so I will add which course they attended.

Quirky Colne by Sue Rose, Sue attended My Art Journey and was kind enough to take part in a little interview with me, so I will be posting it later on this week or early next.

Copper Beech by Wall by Paul Malpass, Paul attended Creative Crafts and has since gone on to do a painting course at Nelson and Colne College. Again this looks better when you are here (stamps foot and wishes I could get the hang of photographing artwork behind glass!)

Caterpillars from Space by Laurence Catterall, Lor attended My Art Journey and has a real knack for titling work! Again he gave me a quick interview... coming soon.

The above is a close up of Sue Roses other work - Bluebell Wood, which is a wonderful textile piece that my photograph does not do justice to at all.

Print by Aubrey Roadway, who attending Exploring Paper and Print. Aubrey has since set up an art group called TenOVus, open to anyone, who meet at Christ Church, Carr Road, Nelson every Thursday from 6.30-9pm. Hope the group goes well Aubrey!

Cornfield by Paul Malpass

An untitled work by Germen Best who attended the short course on Confident Drawing

Pot Cat by Ursula Delaney, who attended the short course on Confident Drawing also.

Don't know if it's intentional but love the play of words and how it reminds me of Top Cat!

Untitled Print by Cath Whittaker, who was on the Exploring Paper and Print course. This is much more wonderful up close!

Untitled print by Rosie V who also attended the Paper and Print course, who has since gone on to start A Level Art at Nelson and Colne College.

Coming Home by Jacqueline Smith who attended the short course on Confident Drawing

Untitled Print by Anne Huntsman who attended the Paper and Print Course

Untitled by Naida Jabar, who attended My Art Journey

Untitled by Germen Best

Fleetwood Beach by Louise Riley who attended the short course, Confident Drawing.

I love the pattern of the water throughout the piece.

Students from Creative Writing wrote pieces of work specially for the exhibition and here they are on display. I love the way they look!

I hope you do get chance to come and see the exhibition in person. It's free entry as always and there are forms to fill out if anyone thinks they could benefit from Arts on Prescription courses or would like to refer a friend or relative. If you do want more details, you can contact me on 01282 661784 or on kirsty.rose@pendleleisuretrust.co.uk

And there was a very special performance on the open evening about Arts on Prescription. I will be adding that soon. ﻿

Tuesday, 13 September 2011

Wow, there is so much amazing work. I know that I hung the whole exhibition and should have already realised but coming to upload all these images it has really hit me! So I'm going to split it into two posts and tell you a bit more about Arts on Prescription itself.

Between September 2010 and September 2011 104 students attended an arts on prescription course. These are art courses in a range of disciplines run in community venues.

The courses are designed for adults with mild to moderate mental health issues such as depression, anxiety and low self esteem.

The courses in detail are:

Fix It Sew It Mend It – a textiles and needlecraft course which was held at The Family Tree Centre, Nelson

Developing Drama at The ACE Centre

Creative Crafts at The ACE Centre

Creative Writing at Williams Hall (This course included a free crèche provided by the children’s centre)

Creative Crafts again at The ACE Centre

My Art Journey at The Beacon Children’s Centre

BabySafe at Williams Hall

BabySafe at The Family Tree Centre in Brierfield

Confident Drawing at Colne Library

Exploring Paper and Print at Colne Library

The exhibition is of work this year’s students have made either in class or at home since the course.

The courses are designed to give people a chance to socialise with others experiencing mild and moderate mental health issues, a chance to make new friends, a relaxing and absorbing activity to take their mind off their issues and to hopefully make people feel more confident, proud of the work they have achieved and maybe gain a new hobby.

The most recent course was the one exploring paper and print and I wanted to show you some images on display just from this course as I think it gives a flavour of the huge amount of diversity in our project.

Prints side by side by Cath Whittaker

Print by Pat Moore

The majority of the exhibition was hung using bulldog clips and I really like the feel it gives so have kept them in the images.

Print by Pat Moore

Print by Pat Moore

I love the organic feel to Pat's work and think she already has a quite distinctive style of her own.

Tango Dancers by Aubrey Roadway

I love the shoes here - Beryl Cook influence?

This is the same image, the Tango Dancers on homemade paper, by Aubrey. It really changes the whole piece.

This is a print by Pat Moore on homemade paper.

This course builds on previous lessons, so the students made the paper in the first two weeks and towards the end of the course they were printing onto it.

Print by Rosie V

The orange is really striking close up, I hope you get chance to see it.

Print by Cath Whittaker

Again, just like Pat, Cath is developing her own approach and style, particularly with regard to colour in my opinion.

Print by Cath Whittaker

Red Sails at Sunset by Eileen Haywood.

Eileens work is much more precise than some of the others, isn't the composition wonderful? I particularly like the birds...

I got to join in on this session and can I just say, I LOVE Marbling! It was so much fun. And I believe there are lots of inspirational marbling artists around who I will dig out and post some links to shortly.

Print by Aubrey Roadway

This one just makes me want to look at that house every day, with those colours. It says Summer to me!

I hope that you enjoyed a first look at the exhibition. Arts on Prescription is a wonderful project to run and I will witter on about it a lot more tomorrow but right now I have to dash. Toodle-Pip. (I have an Agatha Christie audiobook in my car at the moment and it always makes me want to speak like that, oh, and to have a friend called Bunch!)﻿